Corpse Bride is something of a successor to The Nightmare Before Christmas, the cult classic that showed the world what kinds of whimsically creepy stories iconic director Tim Burton could spin. While he is generally credited as the brilliant mind behind it, Burton came up with the idea for The Nightmare Before Christmas while he was working for Disney but did not end up directing it. Disney retained the rights to the story after Burton's departure and revisited it after he found success elsewhere. Burton himself was then unavailable to direct, and the project was taken over by his collaborator Henry Selick.